The first seminar covered Infancy and Early Childhood. Registration is now open for the second seminar in the series on 27 October, led by Dr Michelle Ellefson (Faculty of Education), which will focus on The Educated Brain at School - Late Childhood and Adolescence.

11.10-11.50 Can people with developmental disorders function successfully as bilinguals? Dr Napoleon Katsos (Reader in Experimental Pragmatics, Dept. of Theoretical and Applied Linguistics, University of Cambridge)

11.50-12.30 The primary-to-secondary school transition for children on the autism spectrum Liz Pellicano, Professor of Autism Education and Director of the Centre for Research in Autism and Education (CRAE) at UCL Institute of Education, University College London

12.30-13.10Dyslexia and the brain: the role of rhythmProfessor Usha Goswami, Professor of Cognitive Developmental Neuroscience, University of Cambridge, and Director of Centre for Neuroscience in Education

The effects of early psychosocial deprivation on brain and behavioral development: findings from the Bucharest Early Intervention Project

Professor Charles A. Nelson, Professor of Paediatrics and Neuroscience, Harvard Medical School and Professor of Education, Harvard University

Many aspects of postnatal brain development depend on experience that occurs during relatively narrow windows of time (i.e. critical periods) for development to proceed normally. In this talk I will discuss what happens to children whose postnatal experience violates what we have come to expect as a species; specifically, infants who experience profound early neglect. The Bucharest Early Intervention Project (BEIP) is a randomized controlled trial of foster care as an intervention for early institutionalization. A total of 136 children who had been abandoned at birth and placed in various institutions in Bucharest, Romania were targeted for study, along with a sample of 72 children who lived with their biological parents in the greater Bucharest community. Following an extensive baseline assessment (average age 22 month), half the institutionalized children were randomly assigned to high quality foster care created by the research team and the other half to care as usual (institutional care). This sample has been carefully studied through the first 16 years of life. Key findings covering a variety of domains (including but not limited to IQ, attachment, and brain development) will serve as the focus of my talk. This work will be situated into the broader framework of the 100 million children around the world who have been abandoned or orphaned, 8 million of whom are being raised in institutional settings.

19.00-19.45: Drinks reception

Keynote speaker

Charles A. Nelson III is Professor of Pediatrics and Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School and Professor of Education at Harvard University.

Professor Nelson’s research interests are concerned with the effects of early experience on brain and behavioural development, particularly the effects of early biological insults and early psychosocial adversity. He studies both typically developing children and children at risk for neuro-developmental disorders (particularly autism), and he employs behavioural, electrophysiological (ERP), and metabolic (fNIRS and MRI) tools in his research. He leads the Nelson Laboratory at Boston Children's Hospital in carrying out research on many aspects of infant and child development.

Registration

Please note that registration is open for the morning session and the public lecture but attendance to the afternoon policy workshop is on an invitation/application basis. Please tick the box if you wish to be considered for this part of the seminar.